mormonism: January 2008 Archives

Adios, Mr. Hinckley. Too bad you couldn't take Fred Phelps with you. The only thing I can say positively about you is that thanks to your ministry of shameless and cynical self aggrandizement, there are less people who believe in Joseph Smith's con game now than there might have otherwise been.

Some highlights you won't get from the local news media:

• He single-handedly denied almost as much LDS doctrine in public as me (see the Mike Wallace interview).
• Just like Jesus, he flew around in a private jet donated by the Huntsman famil...er wait. Never mind.
• In spite of holding the office of Prophet, he never made any prophecies or performed any miracles.
• He denied on camera ever directly speaking with God.
• He also denied on camera that men could become like God, which for over a hundred years had been a core Mormon doctrine.
  
• He built a quarter-of-a-billion-dollar Meganacle in Salt Lake City. The homeless continue to wait outside in the cold for food and shelter just a few blocks away. But the homeless couldn't satisfy his ego, so he built dozens of McTemples and a billion dollar mall downtown.

I suspect that Hinckley has been out of commission for some time now.  In the summer of 2007, an inside source of mine at the Salt Lake Tribune told me that the suits from the Church Administration Building had paid an important visit in which they arranged all the details for what they'd need to do in the event of his death.

Given the dramatic and vocal change in the LDS church's public policy over the last few weeks (removing wine coolers from grocery stores, immigration reform), it makes sense to me now that someone else has been in charge. A precedent for this was set with Ezra Taft Benson before him.

I could go on and on, but he really doesn't deserve the time. So here's to your worldly legacy, Gordo. I can honestly say the world is a better place without you.